DDuke

I?ll begin with the complaints. First, signupdamnit writes, ?I think the digital fingerprinting technology should be far cheaper and more open.? I find this statement to be the most ironic comment in the entire thread, yet it seems to represent an attitude that is quite pervasive. Vobile, the software company with which FSC has contracted, expects to be paid a fair price for their intellectual property. They have invested millions upon millions of dollars in this technology, there is an expense to operating and administering these information systems, and they are business people who would like to see a return on their investment. One would think that a group of content owners could sympathize with the fact that Vobile is not willing to give away their intellectual property or to sell their services at a loss. (If you think that Vobile?s prices have been inflated, that they are making more than a reasonable return on their investment, I strongly encourage you to check out the other providers?BayTSP for example, an excellent company that offers a product/services very similar to Vobile?s.)

Second, signupdamnit believes that he ?should not be required to work with any one organization or provider.? Yes, in order to participate in APAP, you must be a member of FSC. FSC invested months upon months of work and incurred significant expenses in order to design APAP as a Member?s Benefit. Membership Benefits, for any membership organization, are available to those who pay membership dues/fees. Again, I would think that this would be a relatively simple concept for webmasters who run membership sites. Would you open up your ?member?s only? area to people who haven?t purchased a membership simply because they don?t think it?s ?fair.??

Third, several people have claimed that APAP is a cash grab. Others claim that it is a struggle for FSC?s relevance. And yet others claim that it is outside the scope of FSC?s Strategic Plan. The Free Speech Coalition is a 501(c)6?a membership organization/trade association. More specifically, FSC is a group of adult entertainment companies that came together to collaborate on litigating, lobbying, educating, collective bargaining, bulk purchasing, etc. It is a group of adult companies, funded by adult companies, and governed by adult companies. (Here, I have to correct Robbie. Robbie claims that FSC is ?supposed to be representing a consortium of adult companies in first amendment cases.? FSC was never and is not now limited to First Amendment issues in its mission. I?ll be the first person to acknowledge that this name is misleading and unfortunate?I wish to hell the founders had chosen something different. While the founders were right in that the name is more politically palatable to the mainstream than something like ?The Pornographer?s Union,? it has led to nothing but misconceptions within the industry. I want to be clear on this. FSC?s mission is: to lead, protect and support the growth and development of the adult entertainment community.

Every year, the entire FSC membership elects members to its Board of Directors. Every three years, these elected representatives develop a Strategic Plan. In the Strategic Plan, they answer the questions, ?What are our highest priorities?? They ask, ?What issues are relevant to us?? ?Over the next three years, what should the scope of our work be?? ?How do we want to spend our money--the money that we, collectively as members, have pooled for this purpose??

The vast majority of issues/problems addressed by FSC require a tremendous expense, and membership dues are used to cover those expenses. When FSC fights .xxx, we don?t make any money; we spend a great deal of money. When FSC fights Cal/OSHA, AHF, and the LA Country Department of Health in order to prevent mandatory condoms, we don?t make any money; we spend a great deal of money. When FSC fights Calderon and his 25% tax on adult products, we don?t make any money; we spend a great deal of money. Despite the fact that these issues affect the entire industry, those companies who pay FSC membership dues shoulder the entire burden. And, it?s important to note that FSC?s membership dues have not increased by one single penny in 30 years. Now, FSC has developed a program to fight piracy, and because we developed a pricing structure that covers the cost of hiring an attorney and administering the program, we are being accused of a ?cash grab.? Unbelievable.

If, despite the reality of what FSC is, you believe that FSC is some sort of nefarious group of parasites feasting on the profits of the adult industry, if you believe that FSC is really some secret group of opportunists living in million dollar Malibu mansions, do not join. Do not become a member. Do not give FSC one single penny. Problem solved. You have nothing more to bitch about.

Now, for those interested in looking forward and who are open to a thoughtful and organized approach to addressing the problem of piracy, both Robbie?s and Allison?s comments make is clear that I have done a poor job in communicating exactly how we got to where we are today. So, I?d like to take this opportunity to correct my mistake and tell you the story of how APAP came to be.

It began, not months ago, as Allison wrote, but rather two years ago, when FSC?s Board of Directors acknowledged the fact that ad hoc approaches to the problem were not working, that FSC had been remiss in not addressing this issue earlier, and that an organized strategy against piracy would be one of the coalition?s strategic priorities. As directed by the Board, I immediately began work on a piracy project plan.

While I do have some expertise in collective bargaining and negotiations, I have limited knowledge of that for which I was negotiating?tools that could be used to fight piracy. On Nov. 18, 2008, FSC hosted an anti-piracy summit. Speakers included Dean Garfield, Executive VP, MPAA; Lawrence Kanusher, Senior VP, Sony Music; David Kaplan, VP, Warner Bros. Studios; David Ring, VP, UMG Recordings; Steve Kang, Senior Counsel, NBC-Universal; Alasdair McMullan, Senior VP, EMI Music, Michael Huppe, General Counsel, SoundExchange; Jennifer Pariser, Senior Counsel, Sony Music; Scott Coffman, President, AEBN; Steve Hirsch, Managing Partner, Vivid Entertainment; and a number of attorneys from Jenner & Block and attorneys from Mitchell, Silbergber & Knupp.

In addition to educating myself and others about the technological solutions available and what other industries were doing, I began to ask our members, practically individually, how we should approach the problem of piracy. In January 2008, at AEE, I had dinner with Scott Coffman (AEBN), Ilan Buni (Gamelink), Eric Johnson (Sureflix), and Richard Cohen (Hotmovies). We spent hours talking about how piracy has affected their companies and the various ways that they would like FSC to proceed in finding tools and developing programs to fight it.

Then, at the xbiz conference in February, we held a meeting with producers, to discuss approaches to piracy. In attendance at that meeting were Phil Harvey and Bob Johnson (Adam & Eve), Steve Hirsch (Vivid), Theresa Flynt and Michael Klein (Hustler), Ali Joone and Samantha Lewis (Digital Playgroung), Rob Novinger and Tony Rios (Channel One), Steve Orenstein and Avi Bitton (Wicked), Bruce Lehay and Keith Webb (Titan), Frank Koretsky (IVD/Pleasure), Christian Mann and John Stagliano (Evil Angel), and Christopher Alexander (Anabolic).

Over the next year, we continued to meet. This group came up with ideas, met with our mainstream counterparts to see what they were doing about copyright infringement, met with tube sites, piloted a few mass-DMCA takedown targets, and organized multi-plaintiff litigation.

It became immediately apparent to all involved that our industry was underdeveloped as far as the technology needed to combat piracy. We met with the companies our mainstream counterparts recommended. During our initial conversations with these companies, we found that, typically, studios pay $30,000 monthly for their services. We negotiated with a number of companies and were able to develop a system where FSC would purchase the product for participating members. Through aggressive negotiations and bulk purchasing we have been able to save FSC members tens of thousands. Throughout the negotiations we made it clear that if the program did not work for the smallest of companies, it would not work at all. Now a studio can track their material, send takedown notices and receive the rest of the APAP benefits for as little as $400/month. That is a marked improvement over $30k for software alone.

FSC contracted with Gill Sperlein a very successful and aggressive copyright infringement attorney and Gill oversees the program that launched last April. APAP is a month to month program because we want to make sure that adult businesses do not feel trapped into a program they don?t like. No one has dropped the program since its inception and we have had many new members. APAP continues to grow and change as we are in constant contact with participants responding to their needs and feedback.

This week we announced that a number of tubesites have agreed to utilize APAP?s software program to block content from going up on their sites. Not only will the software block pirated content from going up, but also offer an opportunity for the content provider to monetize the traffic-the multi million viewers coming to these sites.

At the request of our participants, we are developing the same platform for filesharing sites and will roll that out by month?s end.

Working with Vobile, FSC?s APAP program will stay on the cutting edge of copyright infringement technology and working with our member participants we will continue to build on this ground-breaking program.